Hair Love
Photo courtesy of Sony Pictures, illustrated by Vashti Harrison
The powerful and inspiring short film Hair Love is taking the world by storm - spreading positivity and awareness as it goes. If you haven’t seen the Oscar Winning short just yet - take a peek here. It shares the story of one dad and his daughter’s battle to tame her natural mane for an important day - and highlights how this can be challenging and disheartening for dads everywhere.
Matthew Cherry, who wrote the book Hair Love, claimed his plan of winning an Oscar back in 2012 when his desire was just a dream. Cherry, a former professional athlete turned filmmaker, wanted to “normalize black hair” by bringing positive awareness from a father’s perspective. Hair Love was then released as a short film in August of 2019, and it didn’t take long before it swept over the Internet and won the hearts of many - highlighting an important struggle as it went. It depicts a dad struggling to help console his daughter as she gets ready for a big day. For the majority of the short film, there is no maternal or sisterly presence around to help - and his poor daughter just doesn’t have arms long enough to style her gorgeous natural curls.
If you still haven’t clicked the link—watch it here. The journey of this father and daughter to conquer the curl is both heartwarming and relatable.
Photo courtesy of Sony Pictures, illustrated by Vashti Harrison
We are living in the year 2020 - it is not a secret that equality should exist in every aspect, for every race, size and person on the planet. Yet we still see issues in society that prevent everyone from being able to embrace their own characteristics and values that make them unique and beautiful.
Recently, a large issue was brought to light in the form of the California Crown Act of 2019. The California Crown Act is a law that prohibits discrimination based on hair style and texture. For some who may have naturally straight or wavy locks, this law wouldn’t cause them a second thought. For others who may have kinky, coily, textured natural hair? This law is a gamechanger - and it is a blow towards equality that it took so long to be passed.
Discrimination exists. Despite best efforts, truly eradicating it will take work, respect and the willingness to look at things from another’s perspective. A study done by Dove shows that over 80% of black women are more likely to style or alter their natural hair to conform to social expectations at work and school - similar to the heart-breaking struggle of the daughter shown in Hair Love.The bottom line? Hair shame is a real thing and it’s not okay. It is discrimination plain and simple.
The California Crown Act, acts of social equality on social media and public works like Hair Love are all pointing us in the right direction towards a happier future; a future that not only embraces every hair color and texture, but more importantly, every skin color and human being that lives on our planet.
Hair Love touches the heart of all viewers because it transports us out of our ethnicities by being rooted in something we can firmly understand - unconditional parental love. A love that any parent, no matter their race, can relate to. This can look like so many different things...like a father’s willingness to go outside of their norm to help their daughter feel beautiful.
RevAir was founded in a similar way….a single father who wanted to be able to help his daughters put their hair into ponytails. Many years later, this dad remembered using an actual house vacuum to create the ponytails and reached out to his sister and also his friend, Scott Thomason about creating a vacuum powered ponytail maker. Scott, an engineer and now-CEO of RevAir, has a knack for creating innovative solutions to everyday struggles and was intrigued by the idea of creating an easier way to style hair. The challenge of a ponytail had simply never occurred to him as a father - as many dads think “isn’t that something typically handled by a mother or sister?” After making and successfully testing various prototypes of the ponytail maker, it became clear that using suction on hair had other, more powerful benefits. The team switched gears and began to design and test a device that would use suction to dry hair easier and healthier, with no tears involved (on either end!).
The result of their designs is RevAir - the world’s first ever Reverse Air Hair Dryer. Initially the purpose of RevAir was to make the hair drying and styling process faster and easier, so easy that anyone can do it. RevAir uses tension created by reverse-air and heat to seal the cuticle in the direction that it naturally grows. By drying the hair cuticle and sealing it, the result is smoother, softer hair that typically has a much straighter finish than air-dried or blow-dried strands.
The goal of RevAir is not to singe curls into straight submission, or to remove natural texture - we believe it should be celebrated. It is heart-breaking to see hair straightening tools, chemicals and treatments that often leave natural curl patterns damaged and frail. RevAir takes the high heat and damage to natural curls out of hair drying - so that our natural headed beauties are free to rock their curls one day, or dry for a sleeker finish the next - without any lasting damage. No other tool available can give the same result as RevAir with such little heat.
RevAir believes in empowerment, and the right to choose. Eliminating damaging products and tools gives the power back to hair. We live in a world where we are still passing laws to protect against discrimination. Bringing awareness to the social injustices that exist, from a tender viewpoint of Hair Love sets the stage for more awareness and positive change. Our small RevAir team is enamored with Hair Love and all that it represents. We hope that using our device makes you feel fierce, independent, and beautiful.
Photo courtesy of Matthew A Cherry & Vashti Harrison
Have questions about RevAir - our team or our products? Our team of Advisors are armed with the knowledge to help! Never hesitate to reach out to us, we love to chat.
